


Scars of a Type

by Moonrose91



Category: Doctor Who, Marvel (Movies), The Avengers (2012)
Genre: #coulsonlives, Aftermath of Torture, Fix-It, M/M, Memories, Not Canon Compliant, Scars, Spoilers, and it all started in Thor with their snarking at one another, and scars, and yes there will be violence, because I am cruel and evil that way, if the pairing was any indication, just saying, the f-bomb is used
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-13
Updated: 2012-08-14
Packaged: 2017-11-12 03:06:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/485976
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Moonrose91/pseuds/Moonrose91
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Both Clint and Phil's bodies are a patchwork of scars because, no matter how hard the medical team tries, they always end up with at least one more scar.</p>
<p>Just not all of those scars can be seen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A Very Long Explanation of Scars But Not As In Depth As Believed

**Author's Note:**

  * For [shadowen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadowen/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Fifty Pound Draw](https://archiveofourown.org/works/463849) by [shadowen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadowen/pseuds/shadowen). 



> This story is HEAVILY pulled from Fifty Pound Draw. I am pulling a LOT from that story and, in fact, reference it with the mission that changed Phil's eating habits. I have permission from the writer to play in the sandbox they created and I ran with it.
> 
> I HIGHLY SUGGEST that if you can't read that story, or if that story disturbed you, DO NOT READ THIS ONE.
> 
> I am warning you to the best of my ability.
> 
> It also references what happened there.
> 
> And yes, this person shares a head canon I can't write right now because of things.
> 
> ...It is in the second middle name.
> 
> Also, if I missed ANY TRIGGERS for you, please comment and yell at me and I'll add them.
> 
> I just ask that you be nice about it.

Clint and Phil’s bodies are a patchwork of scars.

They know this, have seen what made those scars when they rescue each other (everyone knows them as the SHIELD Husbands, even if they aren’t, technically, married), and have hauled each other down to Medical to have things looked at.

But, no matter how hard Medical tries, they always walk away with at least one more scar.

Just not all of them can be seen.

After the mission with the cartel and the contact that was shot and Phil’s capture, Phil is unable to eat noodles anymore…or anything, really that could be described as slimy and couldn’t eat meat for months without gagging a little. It took him awhile to explain why to Clint, but they worked around it.

Clint never really liked noodles anyway.

And Phil can have jerky now, but eggs have been officially cut off unless Clint makes them so they don’t have a slimy feel.

However, Phil isn’t the only one.

Clint can’t stand the taste of chocolate since that mission in Switzerland and it was laced with some type of experimental poison that made him twitch and shudder, slowly killing him in the most painful way possible.

He didn’t know what Phil did to get the antidote, but considering he came back hiding the blood on his hands, it had to go into the use of his interrogations skills that he doesn’t like to use but does anyway when it gets to that point.

He usually has them giving up information before pain is applied, extracting information like a surgeon would carefully extract a piece of shrapnel.

And yes, Clint knows he’s very biased in his thoughts on how Phil operates.

And he’s met Phil’s dads.

He’s officially terrified by Canton (he had grinned a bit when insisting on it and that somehow made Clint even _more_ terrified then before), and James is a nice guy, even if he seems to try and make Phil guilty, just a bit, about going and fighting the world with a gun.

Clint is pretty sure that James would lock Phil up in the basement, however, if he ever knew just how much danger Phil was in 24/7.

And, Clint knew he would join Phil because that would make Phil happy and somehow sweet-natured James, who was a retired _teacher_ for pity’s sake, would manage to get Clint in there.

Probably by saying Phil needed help, maybe even use a few code words they made up for day to day use, and Clint would go, thinking Phil was having a flashback or worse and then he would be locked up in the basement with Phil.

That was _if_ James or Canton found out, of course.

Which they wouldn’t because, unless it was _just_ Clint and Phil on the property, he always wore long sleeved shirts that covered every scar, and worked hard to keep the scaring on anyplace he couldn’t hide it, even going so far as to fake an old injury so they abused anything but his face and hands.

So, except for certain medical personnel (two) and Clint, no one saw Phil’s patchwork of scars.

At least, until the fuck-all with Loki.

* * *

It was after Shwarma.

It was after getting checked out by medical and after getting cornered for debriefing (and he could remember every damn thing that happened under it all) and after _everything_ when Natasha settles across from him in the couch in Phil’s office, holds his hands and says the words that Clint fears above all others.

“Clint, Phil’s dead,” she stated.

And Clint’s world shattered.

* * *

If anyone was to press, he could tell that the two and a half weeks between Natasha’s voice telling him his world was over and disappearing into the vents of SHIELD’s HQ building and right now were pretty much a haze.

He remembers that much. Remembers slipping through the vents, listening in, and stealing food from various fridges as he made his way around SHILED HQ in the ducts, not even security drones catching him because he didn’t want to get caught.

He thinks he showered in the communal, but then continued through the vents, ignoring everyone and pretending like his world hadn’t shattered out from under him. That Phil would be up and in the vents right around the next corner if he looked enough when he, somehow, wound up in medical.

Normally, he didn’t go there, but it was the one place he hadn’t turned a corner around in yet, and he needed to be in denial a while longer, when he realized he was near a room.

A high-security room.

And he could hear the sound of beeping and things being used.

He carefully turned right and peered into the room, only to feel like his world had realigned.

Lying in the bed, covered in only a pathetic little set of altered scrubs, was Phil.

Alive, breathing, if in a coma or asleep, Phil.

Clint could give a flying fuck about regulation as he removed the vent and carefully dropped into the room, hoping he had a shower today (he’s remembering more than one time in the communal showers if the really thinks about it).

He didn’t stop, didn’t hesitate, in crossing the room and settling down next to Phil’s bed, claiming ownership of Phil’s hand the instant he could sit down.

He would know Phil anywhere and he investigated.

He shuddered at the scar that was oddly angled. It missed his heart, on purpose it seemed, and decided he would ask later.

Find out later, all of it later.

Because right now, Phil was here and breathing and _alive_.

And with one more scar to his collection, another thing he was going to hide until it was just him and Clint again, all curled up in their bed, and Clint is exploring the scars with his lips and fingers and murmuring scoldings against the newest one, he is sure.

* * *

Clint twitches when he feels fingers tightening around his and he woke up with a snuffle, eyes searching, terrified that it would be a dream, but the anesthetic smell, the beeping and whirring of machines, and _Phil_ , smiling at him, pained and tired.

“Hey. I was wondering what was keeping you, but Fury said you were helping the other Avengers and I just kept missing you because Natasha was making sure you ate and slept,” Phil breathed out, sounding so tired and in pain and _god_ , Clint had never heard anything so good in his entire life.

The voice, not the words, because Phil looks confused and it is only through an extreme amount of self-control that keeps Clint from probably breaking most, if not all, of Phil’s fingers, clenching only one hand in rage. “No, Phil, I haven’t been here because I have spent the last two and a half weeks denying that you were dead. I have been in denial the past two and a half weeks, searching through the vents and hoping that you would pop up around the next corner. Fury told us you were dead. He told Tony and Steve and did something they refuse to talk about that you were dead, and Natasha overheard it on the comm., after knocking me out from Loki’s control, which I am glad Fury didn’t lie to you about me still being under Loki’s control but I guess he couldn’t if he wanted any of this to hold water and…shit, calm down Phil, calm down, please calm down,” Clint answered, not thinking, until Phil’s heart rate began to pick up and he went sort-of grayish and Clint’s rage is already gone, replaced by guilt as he softly talks Phil back from his own rage, pressing Phil’s hand he has threaded with his own to his chest, over his own heartbeat that he is sure Phil can feel pounding through his skin, or maybe it is so Phil can start _breathing normally_ and why the _fuck_ isn’t there an oxygen mask over his face?

He soothed his hand over Phil’s hair and leaned forward, careful of Phil’s injuries and resting his forehead against Phil’s, as Phil relaxed.

And then Phil sighed softly.

“Clint, I need you to do something for me. You aren’t going to like it, and you aren’t going to be happy about it. First, you need to call Stark,” he stated.

Clint raised an eyebrow at him.

Clint knew that Tony and Phil had a very…odd friendship. “Why am not going to like this?” he asked softly.

“Because you can’t do it at SHIELD. Go off, go someplace safe and out of reach (and Clint knows where Phil means) and call him. And tell him that if he doesn’t get his act together, there is a date between me, him, and my favorite meal (and that’s code they came up with for his threat to Tony about tazers and plush carpets and Supernanny). The second thing you need to do is tell Natasha. And make sure that Natasha doesn’t kill the Director. Because that’s my job,” Phil explained, his voice becoming strained, and pained, and Clint realizes that this is why Phil has been accepting Fury’s lies.

He’s been too tired, too in pain, to try and see if Fury was lying.

Clint wonders if he ever would have been told or if Fury would have lied about him being dead and kept Phil so busy on the other end of the world that he never realized that Clint was alive.

Clint shudders a little at the thought, but turns to look at Phil.

“All right. All right, Phil. Go back to sleep. It’ll get done, I promise,” he promised and pulls away, unwilling to extract himself but knowing, if he gets caught, he won’t be able to deliver those messages.

With that, he goes back out the way he came, escaping out one of the many exits that exist for confusion of an intruder and gets off SHIELD property quickly.

AWOL or not, he needs to insure these messages get passed on.

* * *

The small apartment is for only one purpose; to call contacts without SHIELD’s knowledge. If it was ever taken, they would only find pictures that came in the frames (explained easily away by Phil; a brother there, a sister there, a friend, a son-in-law with his daughter…the list of lies went on) and he’s already dialing Tony’s number.

 _“This is Tony Stark’s answering system. I regret…”_ JARVIS greeted, only to get cut off by Clint.

“I don’t have time, JARVIS. This is Clint and I have to deliver a message before SHIELD realizes what I am doing,” Clint answered.

There was silence and JARVIS responded, _“I am connecting you now, Agent Barton.”_

Clint scowled at the address, but didn’t bother to say anything.

 _“Whats’it?”_ Tony slurred.

Shit, he had been drinking.

Drinking heavily, it seemed.

“Tony, I need to tell you something and I need to make sure that JARVIS makes you hear all of it. Phil told me to tell you to get your act together or the next time you see him, he will taze you and leave you to drool in the carpet while he watches Supernanny,” Clint said.

Silence filled the connection and Clint hoped he was believed.

 _“Fury **lied** to us?”_ Tony asked.

“Yes,” Clint answered.

 _“Agent’s gonna kill Fury,”_ Tony stated.

Clint shifted. “Well, not literally, but figuratively, yes,” he responded.

 _“Nu-uh. Agent’s gonna kill Fury dead, ‘cause the only reason me and Cap got it together was because he threw Phil’s bloody collector cards onto the table in front of us,”_ Tony answered.

Clint stilled, remembering how proud of those cards Phil was. Remembered the way Phil had poured over them, showing Clint and telling him the stories behind them all. Showing the one James had nearly died getting for him, showed the one that had been a birthday present when he was 16. The one he got to show they were sorry for making his choice to fight off evil with a gun difficult.

“Let’s not tell Phil that till he’s no longer on meds, ‘kay Tony? JARVIS, please remind him of that when he’s sober,” Clint responded, keeping his voice neutral.

He didn’t twitch as an alarm went off, which engaged whenever SHIELD personnel entered the building.

“I’ve got to go. If Natasha doesn’t contact you in the next few hours, I’m a jail cell at SHIELD and you’ll need to contact her. I know JARVIS can find her in an instant,” Clint stated.

He waited for Tony to say ‘bye’ before he hung up and was out and down the fire escape before he had fully made sure the phone was still in the cradle.

JARVIS could disconnect it.

It _was_ StarkTech after all.

* * *

Natasha was relaxing in Paris when her hotel phone rang. She paused and then picked it up. “Bonjour,” she greeted.

 _“Hey, Natasha, Natalie, whatever you call yourself now, Legolas told me to call you if I didn’t hear from him in a few hours. Apparently, he’s cooling his heels in a SHIELD jail cell for discovering that Agent’s alive, who knew?”_ Stark responded.

Natasha, however, was still processing. “What do you mean Phil is alive?” she demanded.

 _“Clint told me that Phil said to either get my act together or the next time I saw him, it would be to have a date with my plush carpet and his tazer,”_ Tony answered.

“I’ll be in the United States soon,” Natasha stated.

Fury was going to learn what it meant to cross Natasha Romanov.

* * *

Clint hadn’t actually been caught by SHIELD, but he was stuck in a place that didn’t allow him to talk to Natasha.

Mainly, the vents in SHIELD. He wanted to make sure they didn’t move Phil, but he also wanted to see if the doctors were the two Phil allowed to look after him were the ones in charge of him.

He paused in the vent, noting that it was the real Phil.

And that he was tense, and not looking at the doctor that Clint did not know.

Clint bared his teeth at that, resisting the urge to burst in and kick the doctor out.

He had never seen Phil that tense, that…uncomfortable. Clint sighed softly, watching and wondering.

When was the last time he saw Phil relaxed around someone, other than himself?

Sitwell. He relaxed around Sitwell enough to tease him and even ate with him, meaning he trusted Sitwell not to drug his food (that had happened more times than Clint liked to think about).

But he didn’t like letting Sitwell help him bandage it up, but he was pretty sure that the first time (and Clint kind-of couldn’t see straight, had a concussion, and was starting to go into shock from blood loss), Sitwell had kind-of…frozen.

And that was before the rectangle patches of skin on his lower arms had appeared.

It was, apparently, the favorite method to use on Phil when he was captured and tortured for information, which had Clint ready to kill enough, without the reminder when his arms were bandaged by his favorite doctors.

And then it clicked into place for Clint.

Phil didn’t like people seeing his scars because they were used to seeing him as unflappable, untouchable, Agent Phillip J. (‘D,’ Clint could never help adding, even if it was just in his head; looking for a birth certificate for Phillip J. Coulson would get them nowhere, but the knowledge of a J. D., would) Coulson.

And he didn’t like people seeing that he could just as easily (sort-of in the abstract sense; it took a lot to get Coulson caught, so when he was, it usually meant these people’s threat level jumped about eight levels, or they took into consideration that Coulson might have not been at 100% at the time of his capture) be caught as the rest of them, grabbed and tortured for whatever information he might have, or even just for information on whoever he was.

He didn’t like seeing them flinch away or still in shock upon seeing him and he liked people he trusted seeing him.

The stress was obvious on the heart monitor and the doctor; female, dark hair, pale eyes and had the golden tan of someone who either got a lot of sun (or went to a tanning salon) or had it as their natural skin color. “Agent, if you do not calm down, I’ll have to…” she began, only to get cut off by the sound of someone being thrown.

Clint tensed, only to relax when Natasha burst into the room. “You. Out. You. In,” she ordered, looking ready to fling the doctor out as a silver-haired man entered under Natasha’s command.

Clint smiled at the familiar presence of Dr. Holden and the woman stuttered. “Agent Ro…” she began, only to have Natasha haul the female doctor out and into the hallway, cold fury pouring off of her.

“And stay out!” Natasha ordered and shut the door.

Once in the clear, Clint carefully extracted himself from the vent. “You’re not allowed to kill Fury,” Clint stated.

“I didn’t. I just put the fear of Romanov in him,” Natasha answered simply while Clint crossed over to settle next to a now, at ease, Phil.

“Doc, tell me when he can accept big, life-altering, shocks,” Clint stated and Dr. Holden stared at him while Phil let out a low groan.

“I don’t want to know, do I?” Phil asked and Clint merely pat Phil’s arm, gently.

He was going to regret telling Phil about the cards, but he thinks he could convince JARVIS to record the reaming Phil would give Fury when he learns about it.

Even though Clint knew he would have front row seats.

Dr. Holden just shook his head and caught up with Phil, who was relaxed.

It didn’t take long for Clint to figure out that it was because Natasha hadn’t reacted to the scars, some white with age, others raised, even with time, and soon Dr. Holden was explaining when he could be moved and what to expect.

Fury never showed his face, probably either angry or upset with himself that he had done this.

Unknown to Clint, after he had fallen asleep clinging to Phil’s hand and Natasha had left to bother Tony, Fury entered and said that he couldn’t _find_ Clint to tell him before Fury could explain why he had lied.

That first day, no one knew if Phil would have lived.

Phil forgave him, but Fury knew it would only last for as long as Phil didn’t  know about the damage to his cards.

* * *

Months later, when Phil was cleared for ‘high stress situations’ (“Yes, Clint, that means you two can have sex now,” Dr. Holden had confirmed, trying not to smile at Clint’s happy dance), Clint sat Phil down and told him what had happened to his Captain America trading cards.

The unholy shout of, “HE DID **_WHAT_** TO MY CARDS?” echoed in the Avengers’ ears for some time, despite the fact Phil had been nowhere near the communal floor.

“Should we tell him now or later that I got replacements and that I made Steve (“You didn’t _make_ me do anything Tony,” Steve interrupted, though Tony ignored him) to sign them?” Tony asked.

The Avengers glanced at each other and Bruce smiled at Tony. “After he rips into Fury,” Bruce stated, to the agreement of everyone else in the room.

Thor kept his comment to himself that it was a (younger) Loki’s way as well.

Be kind _after_ that person has snarled and raged at another, unless that ‘other’ is you.

However, he doubted anyone would take kindly to hearing good things about Loki and Thor kept his serious thoughts to himself.

What had happened to his brother to change him so?

Turning his thoughts away from Loki, he focused on trying not to smile as he watched Phil storm out of there, followed by a worried/smirking Clint.


	2. The Epilogue That Will Probably Spawn a Sequel

Either way, Phil ended the day with a groveling Fury, a set of signed trading cards, and one that  _didn’t_  ever get into Phil’s set (it didn’t make it into the modern era) sitting on his bedside table with a folded up piece of paper next to it.

With a curious frown, he sat down on the bed and unfolded it to find that it was, basically, an entire script.

And he couldn’t stop the smile from spreading across his face.

_I’m glad you’re not dead. Canton would have_ killed _me._

_Tell your archer that he needs to stop being so watchful._

_Oh, and I’m not upset that you use a gun._

_That was my last incarnation._

_Well, I’m a little upset, but not terribly._

_It would be very bad of me if I didn't like the use of guns, considering who I am with-with._

**Hello again darling.**

**I had to take the note away from Sweetie. You know how he gets.**

**Anyway, congrats on not dying. We’re very happy to know you lived.**

**It was my idea to get you the out-of-date trading card.**

_It was not, River, stop lying to him._

**You first, sweetie.**

_I don’t lie!_

**Rule number one, sweetie.**

_I thought we made it rule number two._

**Oh, no.**

_Oh. Well, then what is rule number two then?_

**You’re the one who makes them up, sweetie, not me.**

_That’s a lie._

**No, it is not. And do you really want to know?**

_Yes. Stop being impossible Mrs. Robinson._

**Sweetie, you** do **realize that** you **are the Mrs. Robinson in this scenario, don’t you?**

_Am not!_

**Are too, Sweetie.**

**And rule number two is ‘the Doctor is worth the monsters.’**

_You make me blush River._

(Phil was starting to think that, at this point, the TARDIS had just been writing whatever they were saying and decided that that was very much like her and thanked her for her own, personal, ‘glad you are alive and not dead’ present.)

**Sweetie, you haven’t blushed since…**

_VIRGIN EARS RIVER!_  (Phil is rather glad the Doctor cut River off. He already knows more then he EVER wished to know about their love life when he was 18 and talking into the phone at River and she decided the best way to cheer him up was to tell him about why the Doctor wouldn't be mad if he saved the world with a gun and it had gone off onto a tangent and Phil was VERY glad that the Doctor took the phone away from her when he did, because there were things he could never unhear.)

**Oh, Sweetie, Phil’s not ten anymore. You don’t get to whisk him away to the 1940s and have Phil meet Steve now that he works with him. He’s a grown man in a grown up relationship.**

_Stop reminding me. Humans grow up so fast._

**I know.**

_Did you just patronize me?_

**A little, Sweetie.**

_I hate you._

**Love you, too, Sweetie.**

“What are you reading?” Clint asked and Phil jumped, gripping his chest in pain and Clint was immediately at his side, rubbing his arms and apologizing until Phil could wave him off.

“It’s okay, I’m fine. I just got a letter from a few old friends of my dads’. They forgot they had a ‘speech-to-text’ thing going, so it is their entire conversation,” he stated, when he heard a muffled noise that he recognized as someone trying to knock sense into their 'sweetie.'

Clint immediately snapped up, tense and Phil gently rubbed his shoulders. “How would you like to meet a _very_ mad uncle and a crazy aunt?” he questioned.

Clint stared at Phil in horror, even as a blue box appeared in farthest corner of their room.

**Author's Note:**

> Um...I have an epilogue that will turn this, officially (instead of abstractly) into a Doctor Who/Avengers Cross-over.
> 
> It is mostly misc stuff and my attempt at humor.
> 
> DO NOT READ THE EPILOGUE IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN ALL OF SEASON/SERIES SIX OF DOCTOR WHO!!!
> 
> I will not warn again.


End file.
